


An Ever-Fixed Mark

by arysteia



Category: Fast and the Furious Series, The Fast and the Furious (2001)
Genre: F/M, M/M, Multi, Soulmate-Identifying Marks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-18
Updated: 2015-04-26
Packaged: 2018-03-23 13:58:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 7,124
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3770830
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/arysteia/pseuds/arysteia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Soulmarks never lie.  But people do.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Fairy-Tale

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Chosenfire](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Chosenfire/gifts).



> I hope you enjoy this, Chosenfire. For your prompt "When Dom and Mia meet Brian, they both recognise him as theirs."
> 
>  _Love is not love which alters when it alteration finds, or bends with the remover to remove. O no; it is an ever-fixed mark, that looks on tempests, and is never shaken._ William Shakespeare, Sonnet 116.

For all Letty’s good natured teasing – and the occasional more caustic barbs that slip out in times of stress they both pretend for the sake of their friendship to forget – Mia has always known _exactly_ how lucky she is. Of all her friends and family, her soulmark is the simplest and easiest to understand. It’s right there on her inner arm, just above her elbow, has been there her whole life as a talisman for the future and something to rely on, just like in the greatest of the old stories, the ones her mom would read her when she put her to bed, fingertips absently stroking over the mark on her own arm in between turning the pages. 

It’s small, and black, and nestles in the curve of her elbow perfectly, subtle enough that she can wear her sheerest tops without worrying about over curious bystanders leaning in to gawk at it, but definitely, indelibly, there. _Brian_ in a man’s quick, impatient scrawl. It isn’t _beautiful_ , exactly, it doesn’t promise flowers or poetry or great romance – just the opposite, it seems more the mark of someone who’s always in a hurry, the way the curves of the _B_ don’t meet the upright, and the dot of the _i_ has flown to nestle almost over the _a_ instead – but it doesn’t promise comic (or tragic) misunderstandings or difficulties in interpretation either. Compared to her school friends and their recipes for gingerbread, or exotic skylines, or in one poor girl’s case a _math problem_ , it’s a concrete promise of a husband and children, a home. Just like her parents, with their proudly matching _Nick_ and _Maria_ in exactly the same place. When Brian, whoever he is, walks into her life, she’s going to know him immediately, and one good look at _his_ inner arm will prove it.

Dom by contrast… Dom doesn’t like to talk about his mark. And it’s easy enough for him to hide. It isn’t on his arm, the odd one out in their little family, or anywhere on his back or shoulders or chest, and by the time she was born he was old enough that he didn’t wander round in a sufficient state of undress for her to see anywhere else. Letty must know what it is, of course, but she respects his privacy far too much to ever talk about it with anyone else, and Mia respects them both too much to ever ask. The fact that Letty stalks round in singlets with the _Acapulco_ on her shoulder unflinchingly displayed to the world, and Dom will wrap his arm around her, fingers glancing over it as though it doesn’t exist, never lingering, and smile in a way that doesn’t really reach his eyes when she makes jokes about some _pendejo_ tourist and how she has no intention of ever going back to Mexico, makes it pretty clear it doesn’t say _Leticia_. If Dom has ever confided in anyone else about it, it would have been their dad, and that topic of conversation is even more firmly closed.

The day that _Brian_ finally appears is just an ordinary day, nothing at first to mark it as special. She has no classes on a Tuesday so she works a full day at the store instead of her usual half, and she’s got the place to herself, the others are all at the garage instead of hanging around underfoot, so she might actually get some study done post lunch rush. She’s already cleaned the grill and the fryer and put away all the dishes, and she’s in no mood to get them out again when a stranger, obviously an out-of-towner, not one of their little crowd of regulars, waltzes in mid-afternoon.

“Kitchen’s closed,” she says, more tersely than she really should, as he sits down at the counter.

“That’s cool,” he says, smiling at her, and it’s the most beautiful thing she’s ever seen, the way he smiles with his whole face and what almost seems to be his body too, turning towards her like a flower to the sun. “I’ll just have a coke, it’s hot as heck outside.”

“I could make you a sandwich,” she says, unable to help herself, and desperately praying he’ll ask for ham or chicken.

“That’s great,” he says, and the smile, if anything, _brightens_. “Thank you. I’ll have the tuna.”

Dom usually makes the tuna; he doesn’t like it any more than she does, but he has a damn good eye for proportions and can mix the mayo and the onion and the celery perfectly without having to taste it. They’re all out though, so this guy’s going to have to take his chances. She opens a can and dumps the contents into a bowl, along with a couple of spoons of mayo. When she starts stirring she realises she should have drained the oil, so for want of any better idea she slams a saucer on top and tries to separate it over the sink.

The guy starts laughing. She wants to be mad, but it’s a great sound, and something about it puts her at ease.

“Toretto’s Tuna,” she says instead, embracing her failure, “World Famous in Echo Park.”

“So I’ve heard,” he says, playing along. “It’s what I came for.” He takes a sip of his coke. “I’m Brian, by the way. Brian Spilner. I’ve just started working at Harry’s and he said I should come down here for lunch.”

She tunes out the rest of his explanation, letting the sound of his voice wash over her while she puts together the rest of his sandwich without really looking. He’s _gorgeous_ , clear golden skin and crystal blue eyes and dimples, and wind tossed blond hair that looks like the sun bleached it rather than an hour in a salon.

“I’m Mia,” she finally manages as the silence starts to stretch. “Mia Toretto.”

“Well, it’s great to meet you, Mia,” he says, then eyes the proffered sandwich dubiously. “Do you think you could cut the crusts off that? Please?”

She tears her eyes away from him to look at Frankenstein’s lunch plate. It’s a disaster, crooked slices of bread with chunks of celery and onion she didn’t bother to dice properly sticking out every which way. Trimming it really isn’t going to help, but she does her best.

He eats every bite.

* * *

Brian comes in every day after that, regular as clockwork, and he always orders the tuna. Mia tries a couple of variations, and she _hopes_ it’s getting better – it surely can’t be getting worse – but he claims to like it just the same every time. They talk a little about Arizona, where he’s from, but he shies away from any mention of his family, other than to acknowledge that he once had parents but has lost touch with both of them. If it’s a test when she mentions her own it’s one he passes with flying colours, genuinely captivated when she tells him how her dad’s parents opened the store, Italian immigrants who built up a business and bought a home, and passed on both to their only son, who initially had no interest whatsoever, with his dream of being a race car driver, and had to be threatened with disinheritance to get him to lift a broom until the day the prettiest girl in the world walked into the store and asked in halting English if they had any _cubanela_ peppers.

He seems to find Dom fascinating too, which is less surprising given Dom’s genius at pulling everyone who even passes his way into orbit, but it seems a more genuine interest in him as _Mia’s brother_ , rather than the feigned interest in _Mia_ that so many wannabe racers have demonstrated in the past to get in good with Dom, whether it’s a discount on parts and mods, or an entry to the racing scene they’re looking for. Brian’s just as interested when she talks about her Honda and the work she and Letty have been doing on it as he is when she talks about the garage their dad built and which Dom has turned into one of the top precision auto shops in the city.

The only minor cloud on the horizon is the fact that Brian’s habitual t-shirts make it plain there’s nothing on his arm, no sign of a mark whether at his elbow or his wrist. It could be anywhere though, Dom’s living proof of that, and just because her parents’ were in the same place doesn’t mean her own has to match her soulmate’s perfectly. He’s everything she wants in every other way, and when neither Vince’s jealousy nor Dom’s surliness can put a dent in his mood or his attentiveness she feels comfortable flirting back with him more obviously. The first time he comes for dinner at the house he comes inside and keeps her company while she makes the salads rather than hovering round Dom at the grill the way the rest of the guys always do, and when he stays in the kitchen after to dry the mountain of dishes she’s just washed, rather than go watch the movie, she decides she doesn’t need to see his mark to know for sure he’s the one.

By the time they have their first official date it feels like she’s known him forever. They chat about the guys, about the _team_ , but it feels right, the natural reaction of a man who wants to be a part of their family. And he does, that much is obvious. The contrast between his rootlessness and her own firm grounding couldn’t be more stark. He confides in her in turn about his best friend growing up, and how they fell out over something stupid and haven’t spoken in years, and she gets to feel like the wise, grown up one for once when she tells him to give this Roman a call, he’ll feel better for it. When he comes right out and says that being friends with Dom is a bonus, but it was _her_ that pulled him in, like she’s got gravity of her own when she’s always felt like the moon to Dom’s sun, it’s everything she’s been waiting her whole life to hear.

She drives him home to Harry’s, taking the opportunity to show off a little of her own skill behind the wheel. As she fishtails across three lanes and sets a dozen other drivers’ horns to blaring furiously he looks a mix between terrified and impressed, but he never once reaches for the grab bar. His eyes flicker between the windshield and the back window, but they always come back to her. They don’t speak as she pulls around to the back of the store and parks the Acura next to his truck rather than dropping him on the street the way she usually does. He takes her hand and leads her through the darkened store to his bedroom, and there’s something so charmingly ridiculous about it, a grown man camping out in a closet in the back of an auto shop, that it banishes her fears. He’s more experienced than her of course, much more so, but he’s gentle, and sweet, and when he strokes his thumb over his name on her arm, and whispers in her ear that he loves her, she absolutely believes him.

It’s only when they wake up in the morning and begin the awkward process of untangling their limbs and the rumpled covers that she realises what she’d half noticed in the night – he hasn’t got a mark anywhere on him. She doesn’t get a chance to ask though; he’s lurching into his clothes and mumbling apologies about having to meet someone, even as her cellphone rings, Dom demanding to know where she is and why she isn’t at home. They kiss goodbye in the parking lot and get in their separate cars, head off in opposite directions, and she tells herself not to worry, there’ll be an explanation. 

The next time they’re alone together is at Race Wars. For a moment she thinks he’s going to comfort her after her fight with Dom, but even as she’s reaching for him he’s asking about Dom, where he’s gone, what he’s doing. She barely has a chance to feel the pain of that though, as he says the words that ruin everything. 

“I’m a cop, Mia. Ever since the first time I met you I’ve been undercover.”

She gets in the car with him, because Dom is still her brother, and she tells him Dom’s number, and watches as he calls it in for a trace. He saves Vince, and she numbly thinks it’s good she doesn’t have to _hate_ him, and she wonders why her mother never told her that marks could lie just as surely as golden tongued boys. 

It’s easy, after that, to leave him standing in the desert. She gets in the car with her brother, and they drive away.


	2. The Brand

The family he grew up in, the company he keeps, Dom’s always stood out for his unmarked arms. He doesn’t cover up; summer or winter, it’s all the same to him, tanks and short sleeved shirts a clear message and a challenge to the world, _I belong to nobody. I’m free._

He can’t remember now the first time he realised his difference, but he was young, very young. It wasn’t that he’d consciously thought about it; he certainly wasn’t caught up in the _romance_ of it, the way Mia and her girlfriends would be later. It was just a fact of life – his parents were the happiest couple in the neighbourhood, everyone knew it. Mama and her friends would gossip about it as they worked together in whoever’s kitchen they’d congregated in, cooking all day while their children played in the yard, waiting for their husbands and brothers to come home for the _fiesta_. The other women would all laugh, or sigh enviously, as Maria described the feeling of finally coming _home_ , after the turmoil of the civil war, and arriving in a new country, and learning to speak English, and then walking into that store where a sullen boy was sweeping up as his mother worked the counter.

They’d only stocked Italian sweet peppers in those days, but she’d asked about _cubanelas_ anyway, and Mrs Toretto had shouted for her son, “ _Nick. Nico!_ ” and promised to send him down to the produce markets to look, but Maria had already stopped caring about vegetables. Nick had looked up at last, and whatever it was she was feeling he obviously felt it too because he’d come straight over to introduce himself, and the moment she told him her own name that was it, Mrs Toretto burst into tears and ran off to find her husband, and Nick rolled up the sleeve of his shirt to show her the _Maria_ right there in the crook of his elbow in her own handwriting, and at that she didn’t hesitate to take off her cardigan and show him the _Nick_ in her own.

They got married that same year; what was the point in waiting? And Dom was born the year after, named for the home she’d left behind, and it’s not like he can help knowing the story backwards, he heard it so often. His dad used to tell it too, when he and his friends were camped out around the grill with a few beers, and even sometimes when he and Dom were alone in the garage; how much he’d hated working in the store, and how lucky he’d been that his parents forced him to pull his weight, because otherwise he wouldn’t have been there to meet her, and where would they all be then?

So Dom had believed, with all the faith in his child’s heart, that his mark would come in in the same place, and in the same way, and he would grow up to be just like his dad, who was, after all, his hero in all things. And it doesn’t, and it doesn’t, and it _doesn’t_.

His arm is resolutely unmarked, and there’s no telling how long his actual mark is there before he finally catches a glimpse of it, just a flash of colour in the bathroom mirror when he twists to catch one of his mother’s earrings he’d knocked off the vanity. It’s another week before he confides in his dad, and between them they manage to angle the big mirror from his bedroom just right so he can see it for himself. He hates it immediately. It’s big, and blocky, and impersonal. Typeset, not handwritten. And even at twelve the sexual connotations of the placement are not lost on him; he knows what the boys at school say about women with tattoos in the small of their backs.

His dad tries to reassure him, says it doesn’t mean anything, that maybe that’s just where his soulmate’s family has their mark, and isn’t it more important he match his future partner than his parents? Then Mia’s comes in, exactly like theirs, and it’s like a slap in the face. He adores her, his baby sister, and he’d do anything for her, but he also resents her, and he resents her _Brian_ , and he resents the whole god damned concept of soulmates. Why the hell should the whole course of his life be mapped out for him by some higher power? He starts spending a lot more time at the track with his dad, and the only time he can forget the whole thing is when he’s behind the wheel, eyes locked on the road ahead, every element of mind and body in tune with the car that cradles him. 

Losing his mom is bad enough but losing his dad feels like the end of everything. The red haze of rage passes, and then he’s just empty. He spends his first week in Lompoc nauseated by how much the stencilled name and serial number on his coveralls looks like the mark on his back, and then the next six months terrified that he’ll run into someone with _that name_ on theirs. By the time he gets out he knows he’d rather die than go back.

The others try to understand him, try to help, but they all have their different ways of coping and none of them work for him. Vince was always embarrassed by his rose, gets his whole arm tattooed to draw attention away from it. Leon does the same, though his star is nothing to be self conscious about. Only Letty seems truly not to care, mark on display to all comers, and scathing about it when she bothers to acknowledge it at all. He goes the other way, flaunting his bared skin, and for all the world knows he’s one of that tiny percentage of people out there that have no mark at all. It becomes part of the Toretto legend, unmarked, unmoored, _free_.

When Mia comes home floating on air he wants to be happy for her. He is happy for her. But when he heads down to the store to check this _Brian_ out, when their eyes meet for the first time… The jolt he feels is unmistakeable after a lifetime of hearing his parents describe it. Brian seems to feel it too, the way he locks eyes with him, but if that’s the case what the hell has he been doing with Mia all these weeks? He goes back to mooning over her, and Dom escapes to his office, and it’s frankly a relief when Vince comes in and starts a fight.

He doesn’t leave though, just pushes his way right into all their lives. Maybe he’s the wrong Brian? It’s _possible_. But the name on Dom’s back isn’t _Spilner_ , and it feels like his whole carefully reclaimed life is spinning back out of control. He falls back on what he knows, threatening to break Brian’s neck if he breaks Mia’s heart, and the way Brian looks him right in the eye, whispers “ _That’s not gonna happen_ ” seems utterly sincere. There’s no way to explain what happens next, except that he really, really misses his dad, the one person he could always talk to, the one person who knew that he didn’t just feel trapped by his mark, but _let down_ by it too.

He takes Brian home and shows him the garage, the photos of his father, the Charger. He tells him about his dad’s final race, and Linder, and Lompoc. Brian looks, and listens, and says exactly the right things at exactly the right times. He’s perfect, and he’s everything Dom never admitted he always wanted. When Brian reaches for him, trails his fingers lightly along the side of Dom’s face, Dom leans into it, and the way his skin _sings_ with the touch has to mean something, surely, marks be damned. They kiss there in the garage, the place Dom has always felt happiest and safest; soft, gentle, slow kisses that make him feel like with Brian it might be all right to let down his guard for once, to not be the strong one, to trust someone else to share the driving.

They head inside without saying another word. The others are all out, at school or at work, and they have the house to themselves. There’s a moment’s awkwardness when Brian spots one of Letty’s singlets on the bed and quirks an eyebrow at him, but she’s always been his best friend, will always be his best friend, and if there’s something like this out there for her then he _wants_ her to go to Acapulco and look for it. He asks about Mia in turn, because it’s only fair, and Brian shrugs and looks embarrassed, and says, “I love you both, man. I can’t explain it, I just really fucking do.”

That’s good enough for Dom.

They tumble onto the bed, pulling at each other’s clothes; biting and licking at each other’s faces, jaws, necks; hands roaming everywhere. Brian flips him onto his stomach with surprising strength, and starts kissing his way down his spine. The flinch when he reaches the bottom is violent enough that he knees Dom in the thigh, hard, but that doesn’t hurt half as much as the way he pulls back onto his knees and sits there, chest heaving, eyes wild and shocked. Dom shoves him out of the way and reaches for his discarded boxers.

“I’ve never even met this asshole!” he says, angry and humiliated, just the way he always knew he would be, reminded in the worst possible way that this _isn’t_ real, no matter how good it feels. “And even if I did, I wouldn’t-” 

“Hey, no,” Brian says quietly, and now he just looks heartbroken. “No. It’s not that. I promise you it’s not that.” He crawls closer again and takes Dom’s hands in both of his, and damn him, it still feels so right everywhere they touch. “I just want to see your face, let me see your face.” And he pushes Dom back down into the bed, and Dom lets him.

* * *

When Brian sails past Dom’s spun out Honda in a blur of burnt orange it’s the most welcome sight he could possibly imagine. He climbs out onto the roof like it’s nothing, and Dom’s terrified for him, and exhilarated by his utter fearlessness, and so, so, grateful when he pulls Vince off the truck and into the car. By the time Leon’s picked him up and they’ve driven the half mile down the highway, Brian’s buckling Vince’s belt around his arm as a tourniquet, and Mia’s trying to keep him calm, and thank God she found him, thank God she trusted him, and her own instincts, and didn’t listen to Dom, and thank God for Brian who knows what to do and isn’t just floundering helplessly like he is. 

He pulls himself together and uses his t-shirt to press down on the wound in Vince’s flank, and Brian’s muttering something about bleeding out and ambulances, and then he pulls out his cellphone and –

“ _This is Officer Brian O’Conner_ ”

– Dom barely hears the rest, something about off-duty, and LAPD, and Life Flight, for the sound of his own breathing and the blood rushing to his head. Brian – _O’Conner_ – is looking right at him, never once breaks eye contact as he gives their location and Vince’s status to the operator. Dom ignores his anguished pleading and turns to Mia, because if she knew and didn’t tell him… She shakes her head, horrified, and of course she didn’t, _Brian O’Conner_ played them both.

They work together to maintain pressure and keep Vince stable until the chopper arrives, and then Brian gets up to help the paramedics carry the stretcher. Dom stands next to Mia and watches till Vince is safely stowed, then heads back to the car. Mia keeps staring after Brian, and for a single, stretched, awful moment he thinks she’s going to stay there with him, but when he shouts her name from the road she comes. She climbs into the back of the car with Letty, and he gets in the front with Leon, and now it’s his turn to look back. He’s still looking back when Leon pulls out.


	3. The Compass-Point

Officer Brian O’Conner, LAPD, has his soulmark removed as soon as he realises he’s serious about making a career in law enforcement. It’s compulsory for anyone who wants to work undercover, and getting it done early is a clear signal he’s committed, that it isn’t just talk when he says he’s going to make Detective before he’s thirty. It doesn’t seem like a big sacrifice at the time, it’s just a random set of numbers that coincides to no area code or post code or anything else that he’s been able to find; that was the very first thing he checked when he got access to departmental databases.

The procedure is excruciating, and they don’t tell you _that_ when you sign up. Not just the burn of the laser on his skin, but the ever increasing ache deep in his chest, and his racing heart and plummeting body temperature. By the time they’re done he’s shaking so badly that they have to hold him down. When the tattooist comes in to add the fake mark he’d picked out of a book of innocuous patterns he starts screaming and throws himself off the table. Sergeant Tanner comes back then, drawn by the ruckus, and after a few minutes of desperate begging agrees that they can call it a day. It’s a risk, and will be something that people remember, but it’s not unheard of for a person to have no soulmark at all. Besides, Brian tells himself, most people he meets will just assume his mark is under his clothes, and certainly he’s not going to be volunteering otherwise to anyone he’s investigating.

His big break comes with a series of high speed truck hijackings that has the FBI stumped. The agent in charge of the case, a guy called Bilkins, approaches Tanner about putting together a taskforce, and Tanner knows him well enough after three years that he recommends Brian for the job despite his relative inexperience. It’s perfect for him; the suspects are all racers and gearheads, the kind of guys he and Rome used to run with when they were kids, before an arrest and six months in juvie got him straightened out, though on a massively larger scale – this is LA, not Barstow – and forget thirty, he’ll get that gold Detective’s shield before he’s _twenty-five_. 

The Feds have done surveillance and preliminary investigation on all the main players in the scene, and there’s only one viable way in. This really _isn’t_ Barstow; the LA racing community is a tapestry of every race and ethnicity, and the gangs tend to form along those lines – black, Latino, Vietnamese – and with his fair skin and blond hair he stands out like a beacon. The only gang he’s got a realistic shot at getting into is the one that operates out of DT’s, an older, family run garage that’s been turned into a precision auto shop by the current owner.

Dominic Toretto himself is a half Italian, half Dominican with a conviction for aggravated assault when he was nineteen but an otherwise clean record. He has a younger sister, a Latina girlfriend, and a bunch of white hangers-on who all have records, mostly vehicular or drug related but nothing serious. They strike him as the least likely of the bunch to be involved, but if he can get in with them they’ll be his introduction to the rest.

He meets the sister, Mia, first, at the grocery store and café she runs, a homey, old fashioned place that feels more like a shrine to the Toretto parents than a going concern. He’s feeling loose limbed and happy, still hyped up from the test run he’d taken in the Eclipse Tanner set him up with. It’s a beautiful car, and even switching to Harry’s fire engine red work truck can’t bring down his mood. Mia makes him what has to be one of the worst tuna sandwiches of all time, but he barely notices. She’s beautiful, tanned skin and long dark hair, and warm brown eyes that light up when she smiles.

He spends a couple of weeks flirting with her, and it’s certainly no hardship. She’s smart, and funny, and the way she talks about her family gives him a pang deep down in a part of himself he thought he’d left behind when he left Barstow. He’s careful never to bring her brother up, letting her talk about him when she wants to, and asking the kind of questions that indicate interest rather than inquisitiveness. Nothing could have prepared him for the impression Dom makes when he comes down to the store one day to do the accounts though. He’s as stunning as his sister, even though he’s almost her complete opposite physically, tall and muscular where she’s petite, shaven headed, and taciturn, almost brooding, in demeanour. They have the same eyes though, warm and rich and welcoming.

His band of merry assholes is something else entirely. Vince, the childhood best friend, takes a dead set against Brian from the start, and the jealousy is obvious, though whether it’s Mia or Dom he’s unwilling to share is an open question. Leon and Jesse are a pair of loveable dopes, seemingly coming to life only when discussing engines, though they’re both loyal and kind. Letty is beautiful but hard as nails, none of Mia’s softness. Her relationship with Dom is a question mark in the casefiles; they’ve lived together for years but don’t seem to be entirely exclusive. A brief affair between Dom and Jessica Tran, the sister of the leader of one of the other gangs, is the talk of the racing community, but seems to have caused problems primarily between Team Toretto and the Vietnamese racers, rather than at home.

It helps cement the friendship Brian’s working on forming with Dom, though, when Johnny Tran and his psychotic cousin Lance, a nutjob in snakeskin pants, almost kill them both by firing their automatics into the Eclipse till the NOS tanks blow. It’s a twenty mile hike back to the city before they can hail a cab, and it gives them a chance to talk. Dom’s a lot smarter than Bilkins, especially, gives him credit for, and more sensitive, too, than Brian had been led to expect by reading his file. By the time they get back to the house he’s more convinced than ever that the Torettos aren’t the people he’s looking for. He’s about to head home when Dom calls after him to come in for a beer. He jogs up the path and almost trips over his own feet when he sees the number on the verandah post, _1327_ in exactly the same heavy Gothic script in which it used to be written over his heart.

It isn’t the insistence that he still owes Dom a ten second car that makes him wince when Dom heads upstairs with Letty, and when Vince comes at him for a second go he’s ready for a brawl. Mia breaks it up though, and she drives him home to his undercover digs, and as they sit out on the street outside Harry’s in her Acura, chatting quietly, he feels a sense of warmth and contentment he hasn’t known since he was a little boy. 

His converted storeroom feels even colder and emptier than usual when he stumbles in afterwards, and as he lies in his single bed he tries to tell himself it’s because it isn’t real, this is _Brian Spilner’s_ place, not his, but the truth is Brian O’Conner’s apartment is little better. He’s lived there since he arrived in town and he still hasn’t unpacked the boxes he brought from Barstow, just bought a television and a stereo and enough cups and plates that if he goes to bed without doing the dishes he can still have coffee in the morning. He wants nothing more than to go back to that big old house at 1327, full as it is of mismatched furniture and family photos and a group of people who would do anything for each other, even if they fight like cats and dogs.

Dom invites him to a barbecue the next weekend, and despite the inevitable fight with Vince it’s the best day he can remember spending in years, the kind of big, sprawling, _family_ gathering the other kids talked about all the time at school but he never truly understood. Dom holds court at the grill, dispensing wisdom and telling wild stories, and just generally lit up in a way that makes Brian feel like maybe this is where he’s truly happiest, not down at the garage at all. He heads inside to fetch more beer but winds up staying in the kitchen to keep Mia company while she finishes up the sides. She’s quiet but cheerful, Dom’s polar opposite in so many ways, and yet he truly can’t imagine them without each other; he’s been tearing himself up all week trying to figure out what _1327_ means, and how the hell he’s supposed to choose between them, but it’s so clear to him now that they come as a set or not at all. 

They sit down to dinner, and as Jesse says grace, and everyone tucks in, and even Vince comes back and tries to make amends, kissing Dom on the head in place of the apology he’s too proud to utter, Brian knows this is everything he ever wanted. A home, and a family, and the unmistakeable sense that he’s finally found his place in the world. It’s what he’s been looking for all his life, leaving Barstow, leaving Rome, joining the police, and he’ll do anything to keep it. As soon as this case is over, and the Trans – it’s got to be the Trans, none of the other gangs come close to them in attitude or behaviour – are safely in custody, he’s going to sit Dom and Mia down and tell them everything. It won’t be easy, Dom especially will be angry about being lied to, but he’ll make them understand. He’ll even leave the force if that’s what they want. But he won’t leave them. Ever.

He almost comes clean when Dom starts telling him about his dad, and how trapped he feels by the weight of his responsibilities. He’s touched, and honoured, by how much Dom seems to trust him after such a short time, and despite his past experiences. He’s angry, too, at Bilkins and Tanner. He isn’t sure if they don’t know the full circumstances of Dom’s assault on Linder, or just don’t care when they insist that he’s a mindless thug. He’s more determined than ever, though, to prove that it’s someone else behind the heists. 

When he reaches out to Dom he only means to offer comfort. But when his fingers touch Dom’s face the connection between them is so strong he can’t help pulling him in. They kiss right there in the garage, and Brian forgets for a moment about being a cop, about being Brian O’Conner. In that moment he truly is everything he wants to be, everything Dom thinks he is, and he follows him into the house without hesitation. He’d follow him anywhere. 

They fall into bed, and everything’s perfect; he instinctively knows exactly where to touch Dom to make him writhe and moan, and Dom’s hands are equally confident on his own body. He’s never felt so alive and in the moment, not even when he’s driving. He flips Dom onto his stomach and starts mouthing his way down his back. It’s gorgeous like the rest of him, muscled and firm, and Brian could spend forever touching his honey gold skin, until he sees –

_O’Conner_

– his own name in block capitals in the curve of Dom’s spine, right above his ass. He jerks at the shock of it, can’t help it, and Dom assumes the worst and tries to pull away. Brian doesn’t let him go. He’ll never let him go, now that he knows for sure.

He takes Mia out for dinner the next night. They go with Dom’s blessing and it feels like every piece of his life is coming together at last. The questions he asks her about the team, about Letty especially, but also about the guys, are nothing to do with work; he genuinely wants to know everything there is to know about the family. _Their_ family. He’ll even do his best to make up with Vince. When she drops him home he doesn’t expect her to follow him inside, but she does, and even though she’s obviously nervous, she’s also defiant, all Toretto, when she shows him the _Brian_ in her elbow. It’s the final missing piece, and he finds himself unable to stop touching it, telling her over and over how much he loves her as he does, in the way he hadn’t been able to with Dom. 

In the end, _they_ leave _him_. He saves Vince’s life, and probably Dom’s too given the way he was driving and the fact he never would have given up on Vince while there was breath left in his body, and they leave him standing alone in the desert. He’d known they would. The way Mia looked at him when he told her he was a cop, like everything he’d ever said to her was a lie; the way _Dom_ looked when he told him his real name, like he was dying inside, like he’d _rather_ die than be so betrayed. He’s still a cop though, still a sworn officer of the law, and he’s angry to boot because _they lied to him too_ , so he climbs back into the Supra and drives back to the city, back to 1327 for what he knows will be the final time.

He almost manages to talk Dom down, but the Trans show up and ruin everything. The last glimpse he has of Mia she’s cradling Jesse’s broken body in the driveway of the home he’d wanted so much to share with her. When Dom and he meet up at a red light after finishing things with Johnny and Lance it feels just as inevitable. The light turns green and they both hit the gas, one final race, but this time what’s at stake isn’t his car, it’s his whole heart. They hit the railway crossing together, and for a second he thinks he’s won, _they’ve_ won, but then a semi appears out of nowhere and hits the Charger broadside. It catapults right over the Supra, flips a couple more times before coming to rest on its roof a hundred feet away.

When he pulls Dom out through the broken window he can barely stand without support. He’s covered in blood, Vince’s, Jesse’s, his own, but the agony on his face isn’t from his physical injuries. The sound of sirens is unbearably loud as they stand there in silence, and it’s getting closer. Brian remembers with anguished clarity what Dom said to him the first time they raced, about Lompoc, and how he’d die before he went back. It’s the easiest decision he’s ever made in his life to hold out his hand with the keys to the Supra in it. Dom’s fingers touch his as he takes them, and the charge between them is still electric, though subdued now by grief. There’s a million questions in his eyes, but Brian has no answers for any of them, and maybe Dom knows that, because in the end he settles for “ _You know what you’re doing?_ ”

Brian shrugs, and tries to smile. “I owe you a ten second car.”

Dom nods, and gets in the car, and this time he doesn’t look back.

* * *

Brian makes it out of LA an hour ahead of the cops. He doesn’t know whether to laugh or cry at the way his entire life has been upended, and the people he would have called his brothers yesterday are the ones hunting him today. He leaves his shield for Tanner to find, and he does feel bad about that, that he couldn’t live up to what Tanner had seen in him. He steals a car – everything’s come full circle now – and drives clear across the country, stopping only for food and sleep until he’s in Miami.

The very first thing he does after he gets there, before he looks for a race, or a place to crash, is to pull up alongside a scantily clad young couple holding hands on the promenade. The man looks at him suspiciously, and steps between the car and his girlfriend, but relaxes when Brian compliments his full sleeve tattoos and asks where he had them done. Directions acquired, he heads straight there, and a roll of fifties from the stash he’d won at Race Wars before everything went wrong gets him in without an appointment. He gets the _1327_ put back where it was, where it always should have been, over his heart. It eases something in him, and after looking at it in the mirror he climbs back onto the table and adds a _Mia_ in the crook of his right elbow, and a _Dominic_ in the small of his back. He might not be able to have them, but they’ll always be with him, wherever he goes.

**Author's Note:**

> This wound up a little more bittersweet than intended, but as we all know, the Fast and Furious films fix themselves. You know these three will meet again, and this time they'll be ready.


End file.
